


You're the pink in my cheeks

by YNAD_77



Series: ATLA Femslash submissions [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: ATLA Winter Femslash Week 2021, Angst, Childhood Friends, F/F, Fluff, Happy Ending, Implied Child Abuse, It is just an exploration of Mai and Ty Lee's relationship through the ages, It isnt explicit but Zuko's Agni Kai and burnt is implied, MaiLee endgame, Minor Mai/Zuko, Relationship Evolution, i am soft for these two, mai's pov, minor Azula, minor Zuko
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 13:21:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29208027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YNAD_77/pseuds/YNAD_77
Summary: Mai knew she and Ty Lee would never grow old together. She hadn’t known it all her life, though.An exploration on Mai and Ty Lee's relationship over Mai's age.ORWINTER ATLA FEMSLASH WEEK DAY 5: Childhood Friends
Relationships: Azula & Mai & Ty Lee, Mai/Ty Lee (Avatar)
Series: ATLA Femslash submissions [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2137944
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11
Collections: Winter ATLA Femslash Week 2021





	You're the pink in my cheeks

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer, English is not my first language so if you see any typo or mistake please take in consideration, I am doing my very best. You can find me on Tumblr like @ynad-77, I am always down to talk about anything really 💓💓  
> The title (and overall inspiration) is from the song Monster of Adventure Time (specifically King Princess’ version)  
> Kudos and Comments are always appreciated. I hope you have a nice day!!!💕💕

Mai knew she and Ty Lee would never grow old together.

She hadn’t known it all her life, though. She hadn’t known it, for starters, when she was just six years old and was knew into the girl's Academy. Her parents had heard she was going to be classmate of the Fire Lord’s daughter and had trained her with a year of anticipation to be polite and well-behaved. Mai had delivered in form and time, Mai always delivered on form and time.

Princess Azula was mean and rude to the other kids around but knew how to respect the authority. Mai liked that, the other guys around them were loud and obnoxious but the princess was always too neat. And Mai was too. Maybe there had been where the foundations o their friendship had laid; they were both good girls; smart, respectful, and quiet. Mostly quiet. Which was why Ty Lee’s addition to their friendship was so weird.

Well, now that she thought about it, it wasn’t _that_ weird. Azula had always been a smart person and she could recognize the value in the people she surrounded herself with; Ty Lee was cheerful and nice, which made her friends with everyone around. Unlike Mai, Ty Lee was loud, and her eyes sparkled all the time. Mai could see the appeal for which Azula had chosen her to be her friend, Ty Lee had information of everyone around her and had an “Aura” that was easy to trust.

Which did come as a mystery to Mai, even after all these years, was how or why had she specifically become friends with her. Why had she begun caring for the other? Why had she begun trusting her and enjoying her company? That was the real mystery.

For her at least. Ty Lee was nice and cared for everybody, so Mai didn’t find it peculiarly weird that the other girl would care for her as well. But Mai wasn’t one who took care in others, her parents were politicians and she knew of this word; relationships were only good if you benefitted from them, that was why she had gotten so much praise when her parents found out she was Princess Azula’s friends, but still obliged her to stay quiet and not to disturb her. they hadn’t cared for Ty Lee. And in the midst of six years old of course, she had dared to thought that she and Ty Lee would be together forever.

When she was eight years old and Prince Zuko was ten it was already a plan for them to wed someday. Mai didn’t like to think about it much, she knew that politically speaking it was good. It was even great!! She had been friends with Azula for two years now and she had trusted her enough to suggest their alliance in the first place, because of course that if the world got moved around was because Azula was behind it. And Mai almost didn’t have a problem with it, really. She liked prince Zuko, he was almost nice when he was not throwing her in fountains. He was kind and never had that look Azula had as if she was always planning something beforehand.

Besides, Mai couldn’t really complain, she had always known she would be set up with an important politician. Getting married for love had never been on the table for her and she knew that much, and she got to be engaged with no other but the Prince itself; a more powerful alliance would have been impossible. She had done well; her parents had congratulated her and had gotten her a new knife.

By the age of eight, she already had an impressive collection of knives, each for evetime she was a good girl. The first one she had gotten the day she had befriended Azula and her collection had grown ever since. No one ever gave her anything nor congratulated her for being friends with Ty Lee.

And she didn’t know of love yet, she hoped she could grow to love Zuko and she could grow to love her too. She didn’t want to be in an entirely loveless marriage, even if they didn’t love each other as partners, at least as friends. She could always use a friend in him, especially if the plan of keeping Ty Lee by her side was still going.

Mai was only eight and yet couldn’t imagine a life without her friend. The latest and weirdest addition to Azula’s group was already a constant delight in Mai’s. They talked a lot, more like Ty Lee talked and Mai listened, and that wasn’t off, Ty Lee talked a lot. But Ty Lee listened to her too; she asked her all kind of weird things she had never stopped to think about for she had never really had a word. “What is your favorite color?” “My parents only let me dress red and black” “That is not what I asked”, or her favorite season, or her favorite flower.

Knowing Ty Lee came hand in hand with knowing herself and allowing her to enjoy the little things in life, like the pink girl beside her. But Ty Lee was no daughter of important politicians, she was almost ordinary. Mai would come up with something, or Azula would as she always did, but she couldn’t be kept from growing old with Ty Lee by her side.

Mai was eight and didn’t know much of life, or love, or what would be of them. She only knew that Ty Lee would grow old by her side and that her favorite color was pink.

Mai was nine when Fire Lord Azulon died and the crown passed not to his eldest son, but to Fire Prince Ozai. Mai was nine when her parents gifted her a whole new collection of the most expensive knives as she became Fire Lady to be and secured them a position inf the Fire Nation politics. Mai was nine when she was invited to the Fire Palace to meet her future Father in Law, who was pleased with her docility. She was nine when she took lunch with Zuko alone and they got to know each other better.

Mai was nine when Zuko broke into tears one time because his mother had disappeared, and she didn’t know how to offer him comfort. But she remembered what Ty Lee did with her when her silence became even too loud for her to bear, she listened to him and grabbed his hand. It didn’t go unnoticed the way Zuko’s hand against her didn’t make her shiver with excitement or made her cheeks turn pink. Mai was nine years old when she knew that the color of her cheeks belonged only to Ty Lee and that frightened her.

Mai was nine when the future of growing older next to her best friend disappeared into the distance.

Mai was eleven years old when her whole world crumbled into pieces and stopped believing in a future with her best friend at all.

As any daughter of politicians, she attended the Agni Kai. It was a huge event for the nobility, but it became even more important to her when she knew it was prince Zuko the one who was fighting it. Not because she cared for her fiancé's honor, like her parents, but because in the three years they had been engaged their friendship had grown. Zuko was nice and kind and didn’t mind that she didn’t smile often or her silence. But Mai had never found it in herself to really love him, not like she properly should have, at least. 

But after that day everything went down too fast. Zuko had lost against his father and lost his honor in the process. Mai knew better than to open her mouth and try to defend him, he had been burned for speaking out of turn after all. Fire Lord Ozai had been merciful, her parents had told her, by sending them away and saving them from the humiliation of having a daughter engaged to a banished prince. They could have gotten it much worse, they had told her, but Mai couldn’t picture how anything could be any worse.

She couldn’t have cared less about leaving Caldera, she knew she would miss Azula who now was busy studying how to be the next Fire Lord as the hopes of her brother triumphing were close to null. But she would miss even more Ty Lee, who had found her new call; Ty Lee had always been good with acrobatics and all that flexibility stuff and she had found her new place as a circus performer. And Mai was happy for her, she really was. She didn’t cry at night about her friend having the chance to follow her heart while she was taken away from hers, of course, she didn’t, because Mai was a good girl, and good girls didn’t cry or mourned over the loss of a friend.

By the age of fourteen Mai knew for a fact she would never get to grow up next to Ty Lee, not as a friend and much less as anything more. However, her life took a strange turn when Princess Azula stepped into the door of her life once again. Mai was fourteen years old when she felt her knees shake as the arms of Ty Lee embraced her into a tight hold, she couldn’t help but to think of herself as weak but at that moment she didn’t care, she was reunited with Ty Lee once again.

She couldn’t help but wondering if Azula knew her soft spot for the girl, she thought she must, or else she wouldn’t have risked coming alone and Mia declining her offer. But when she brought Ty Lee by her side there was no way Mia was saying no. Azula had told her she needed her help to get done what her brother hadn’t, and while Mai held no interest In any of the Fire bender’s plan, she followed through if only as an excuse to be with her childhood friend once again.

Mai was fourteen and sitting on a beach in front of a bonfire when she realized how fucking messed up kids, they all were, and how pathetic their lives had become. It would have been almost comical how exposed the beach had gotten them had it not been for the ache of her heart Ty Lee provoked in her. It was a good pain, though. She realized that night while holding Zuko’s hand that he didn’t love her and that she didn’t love him back, and instead she faced the problem that loving Ty Lee involved. Suddenly, a future together wasn’t as far as it had been in the last three years.

Mai was fourteen years old when Zuko broke her heart. Even if she didn’t love him as her future husband-to-be, she had thought there was some friendship love among them. She would have never expected being left with only a letter behind. While Azula was too busy planning on how to catch her brother and stressing over facing the consequences of having lied to her father about the Avatar, Ty Lee was there for her. Ty Lee was _always_ there for her and she tried to reciprocate until she couldn’t.

Mai was fourteen years old when betrayed Azula for Zuko’s sake. She knew Azula would have killed him were she given the chance, and while Zuko had broken her heart she did love him and just couldn’t let him get killed like that. She was fourteen when she took her own destiny in her hands and threw away everything she was taught. She was fourteen when she no longer cared whether she was being a good girl or not. But she was fourteen too when she deliberately threw away any possibility of growing old next to her best friend. She was fourteen when she felt fear of Azula, even if she would never admit it out loud, she hadn’t known back then how far her friend would go against her for her betrayal or if she actually stood a chance against her.

_Mai was fourteen years old when she found out where she stood in Ty Lee’s heart._

And now? Now Mai was thirty years old and she knew they would never grow old together, for she would never grow old of the woman who lied in bed next to her. Despite her strict routine as a Kyoshi warrior, Ty Lee loved sleeping as much as she could on her free days, unlike Mai who was an earlier riser. But she didn’t care, it only meant she had more time to observe her wife sleeping next to her. Mai was thirty years old and sometimes she still found it hard to believe she got this next to her, the only thing she had ever wanted in her life, the only person she loved with her entire heart. Mai was thirty years old and loved the fact that the pink in her cheeks and her whole spirit and soul belonged only and solely to Ty Lee.


End file.
